"Of his complicity with Burr but little doubt is now entertained and proofs are not wanting of the existence of his designs upon Mexico, from the period of his note in cypher to Governor Gayoso de Lemas (February, 1797), and his dealings with [Captain Philip] Nolan, down to the conspiracy of 1806.
"It has been stated that Wilkinson himself planned the exploring expedition of Pike, in order to obtain for his own purposes a more perfect knowledge of the country, and that he availed himself of his official authority to have it ordered by the Government. [See [note2, p. 564].]
"The Mississippi Herald of September 15th, 1807, published the affidavit of Judge Timothy Kibby, of the Louisiana Territory, acting Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas for the district of St. Charles.
"The affidavit sets forth—
"'That in confidential conversation the general (Wilkinson) speaking of Pike's Expedition, upon inquiry, replied, smiling, that it was of a secret nature, and that Lieutenant Pike himself was not apprised of the ultimate object of the expedition, but that his destination was Santa Fé, treating with the Indians as he advanced.
"'He (Wilkinson) intimated that Lieutenant Pike had been dispatched by his orders; that the plan was his own, not emanating from the Government, but assented to.'"
With these pertinent particulars I could—but need not—forbear to couple the racy characterization given by Mr. Prentis, p. 198 of his Kansan Abroad:
"The military officer in charge of the western country at that time [1806] was General James Wilkinson, a restless, bombastic, fussy old gentleman, with a rare faculty for getting into difficulties. As an officer in the Revolutionary army, he was concerned in the [Thomas] Conway cabal, a plot to supplant Washington, and place in his stead General Gates, an officer who afterwards got beautifully thrashed by the British at Camden. He turned up in the army, after being for a while a merchant at Lexington, Kentucky, in 1791; received Louisiana from the French in 1803, and contrived to get mixed up in the Burr business to such an extent that nobody knows to this day, I believe, which side he was on. He was investigated, court-martialed, and acquitted; went into the war of 1812; served on the Canadian frontier; was a conspicuous failure; was court-martialed again [subjected to a court of inquiry], and again acquitted; and finally, there being in those days no chance to enter the lecture field, he wrote his memoirs [1816], and retired to the City of Mexico, where he died.
"General James Wilkinson in his day was probably the subject of more uncomplimentary remarks than any man of his caliber in the country, and I deem it no more than justice to say for him, that, with all his faults, he was the steadfast friend of Zebulon M. Pike."
I may add, that left-hand compliments to this notorious individual have been current from that day to this, and are still in order. One of the keenest of them is attributed to a distinguished contemporary who, it is said, favored his appointment to the command of the army as the only way of "keeping him out of mischief"!